A Nanny For The Professor

***

I want you to stay. Those five little words catapulted through Camilla’s mind for hours, wondering if she was truly interpreting them the way he intended them.

Did he mean he wanted her to stay, as in stay the night? With him? In his bed?

Hell, that’s how she hoped he meant it.

But there was a chance he meant he wanted her to stay for other reasons, too. Maybe she had done something he didn’t approve of, or Rynn had said something to him that had him questioning her abilities as a caregiver. Camilla couldn’t think of anything she could have done that would be misconstrued, but that didn’t mean that a four-year-old couldn’t see things differently.

Maybe Brock wasn’t happy with her as Rynn’s nanny. Maybe she just wasn’t cut out for this kind of job. Hell, maybe he was going to fire her because of the sexual tension between them. If he felt it with the same insatiable desire she did, then there was a chance Brock Hanlin didn’t want that kind of distraction, especially not when that distraction was supposed to be the one looking after the little girl that was his whole world.

That’s it. Brock was going to dismiss her from his employ. It made the most sense. If he had truly intended for her to stay the night with him, to feel the rush of giving themselves over to the relentless need that pulsed between them like a lifeline, then surely he would have given her something more to cling to before he left. More words. More explanation.

Hell, he could have leaned in the mere inches between them and pressed his mouth to hers. That one little gesture would have told her everything she needed to know.

Instead, she was sprawled out on the couch in the living room after cleaning up the kitchen and snack dishes, wishing Rynn was awake just so she would have a distraction of her own to keep her rampant thoughts at bay. Wishing she knew something, anything, beyond the tidbit of information he’d given her.

She heard the door open and the beeping of the alarm being reset. In a way, it seemed like forever since Brock had left, and only minutes at the same time. Camilla let out a loud, steadying breath and stood, rounding the corner.

What met her on the other side of the wall answered every question without so much as a word uttered.

Chapter Five

Brock

In his nine-year history of being a university professor, Brock had never taught a class on autopilot.

Until tonight.

As he pulled the car into the driveway, he couldn’t even recall what exactly he’d lectured on, or how well the students had received his lecture. That had never happened before. Brock took his career seriously, and he prided himself on being a good and well-liked teacher among the faculty at Grexton.

But tonight, something was more urgent. More dire and consuming.

And that something was Camilla Benton.

He’d asked her to stay on a whim, thinking she would turn him down in an instant. Despite their age difference, someone had to be the responsible one. It wasn’t him, or he would have been able to refrain from asking her to stay in the first place, but it obviously wasn’t going to be her, either.

Camilla wanted him. There was no way to hide the yearning that shrouded her eyes. He recognized it because he was sure he was wearing the same blatant need on his own face. He wanted her, too. With the heated desire of a thousand red-hot suns.

And his three-hour lecture had been governed by that desire, his need pulsing through him and growing with each minute that passed without her near him. Without her against him. Under him.

By the time he pressed the code into the front door of his house and stepped inside, all Brock’s self-control had been swept away by the incessant throbbing of his hardness and the boiling of the blood in his veins. His resolve hung by a thread.

So, when Camilla came around the corner, eyes wide and fearful, there was nothing he could do but pull her to him in a frenzied hurry, desperate to feel her slender body against his in any way he could get it.

His mouth crashed down on hers as he pushed her up against the wall beside the doorway and pressed his entire body against her, fueled by the realization of just how perfectly she fit against him. He tasted her mouth hungrily, his tongue exploring every warm, wet inch of hers, tasting the sweetness that was all Camilla. She moaned against him, the decadent sound reverberating against his lips, only enticing him to continue, to take what he needed.

“Rynn...” He breathed out his daughter’s name in a husky pant. “Tell me she’s asleep.”

“Yes.” Camilla’s own breath came out labored, in a rush. “For hours.”

Relief washed over him as he pressed his forehead to hers, letting his tongue flick out to touch her bottom lip. The action, and the whimper it elicited from her throat, only made his rigid cock ache more brutally. “Stay with me.”

“Are you sure that’s a good idea?” she asked, but whether or not she realized it, Camilla was nodding while she spoke. Her fingertips had pulled the back of his dress shirt up, tracing sensual circles against his lower back.

Her body was betraying her even if her mind was holding on to some semblance of control.

“I frankly don’t give a damn, Camilla.” His eyes burned into hers. “I won’t be gentle with you—I can’t. I want you so goddamn bad I can barely think straight.”